Luke and Kendra were on their honeymoon. They were celebrating the beginning of a brand new venture for both of them. On the sleepy beach at Curaçao, they walked along the sand and waded, hand in hand, as the sultry Caribbean waves washed over their feet. The sun was setting in the distance, turning the whole sky a coral and salmon red.

Luke stopped and gazed into Kendra‘s eyes. This was the woman he would spend the rest of his life with. She was perfect. Kendra‘s eyes filled with awe and gratitude, for she had found her prince and knew she was safe, at last.

He kissed her in a soft and tender, but deep and passionate way, as only one at the start of a beautifully romantic story can do. The two were moved to embrace. It was as if the rest of the world had disappeared. It was only them with the sea and the setting sun and their love.

Just then Kendra felt something tap her ankle and roll over her foot. Then it rolled against Luke’s foot as the tide went back out. They looked down and saw was sank into the sand between their feet was a small glass bottle.

Luke knelt down to pick it up and saw that it was closed. They examined the bottle. It was a worn bluish white, as sea glass becomes over a long time in the salt water. It’s cork had some chunks missing but remained intact.

“I think there’s something inside,” Kendra remarked.

Luke pried at the cork, “Let’s see. Maybe it’s a late wedding present!” They laughed.

Upon opening the bottle, Luke pulled out a single piece of paper folded in thirds. He gave it to Kendra. She carefully unfolded the page and read aloud the simple message printed there in red ink.

“Urgent.”

The couple looked at each other, puzzled. It was as if they had gotten a cryptic fortune from a cookie. They couldn’t understand what it meant, but thought perhaps it was some kind of practical joke.

Kendra put the message back in the bottle and took it home with her as a souvenir of their honeymoon.

For years, she couldn’t imagine what the message meant or who it was written for. She thought maybe it was part of a greater mystery that she would never understand. Every time she heard the word “urgent” she would think of the desperate soul who must’ve written that message in a bottle. Luke laughed it off as me coincidence and would tell the story at dinner parties to entertain their friends.

Kendra would laugh, too, but she knew the message meant something deeper. She finally broke down and took the message to a specialist - an artifact analyst at the university.

After carefully examining the page, he revealed to her what the message actually said. Indeed, she had only ever read the part of it that was visible. The rest was written in a pale ink like egg white, perhaps fifty or more years ago. The analyst used some writing retrieval methods that she didn’t fully understand but he was able to reveal the message, in full:

“Rebellion! InsURGENTs have taken capital. Escape to Cuba. Meet me in Baracoa. Love, Alejo”

It was an urgent letter, after all. From one lover to another. Kendra would come to find out it was probably from a Haitian refugee, maybe in the military, who had no other option to communicate with his lost love. But he put his faith in a message in a bottle, hoping against the odds that somehow love would guide the message to its intended recipient. For such faith is the nature of love.

Kendra and Luke came to cherish the message in the bottle and kept it on their mantle for many years, telling anyone who would listen about its romantic story and its poetic meaning. It was a bit of history they felt was connected to their own.

Long after they were old and gray and Luke had passed away, Kendra gave it to her daughter to keep and pass along the women in her line. On her death bed she reminisced on that day on the beach during her honeymoon.

She smiled at her daughter as she thought back, “Fill your days with love… make each day count. It goes too fast. Take nothing for granted. It’s surprising how urgent life can be.”